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Cloud9 beaten by a benched player from their own roster

Cloud9, who had been the last undefeated team in the North American League Championship series, had a bit of a rough weekend. First, they were knocked down a peg by Team SoloMid, who had a shaky start to the Spring Split but have recovered in excellent form and now share the top spot. Then, like the twist in a goddamn anime, they found themselves facing off against yet another former Cloud9 legend, William “Meteos” Hartman.

Once dubbed “the king of the jungle” during Cloud9’s miracle run to the top of the LCS in 2013, Meteos has struggled to live up to his old performance. Recently, he was benched by the team, replaced by the young, talented jungler Juan “Contractz” Garcia, who had been running rampant through Challenger for months. The move seemed to be paying off; Contractz excelled at playing assassins like Kha’Zix, Rengar and Graves, who have all come into the meta as of late.

Who would have guessed that it would be on the bench that Meteos’ dormant mutant gene would reactivate? After Rami “Inori” Charagh was forced to return home to Vancouver following a family emergency last week, Phoenix1 announced on Facebook that Meteos had “graciously agreed to sub in for our team on extremely short notice.” Of course, Phoenix1 had a match with Cloud9 that weekend, meaning Meteos would be squaring off against his own team.

If Meteos had any reservations about going too hard on his old brothers in arms, he certainly didn’t show it. Meteos quickly revealed himself to be the lynchpin in P1’s approach, with his aggressive ganks establishing an advantage for their lanes over and over. Though both games were hard fought, Phoenix1 ended up dealing out Cloud9’s second loss this split. At the very least, everyone seemed to have fun:

Cloud9’s battle against their own jungler came only a week after their match against FlyQuest, in which former C9 mid laner Hai “Hai” Lam and support Daerek “Lemonnation” Hart pushed them to their limit, almost securing a win of their own. If Cloud9 keeps facing off against their old team members, Michael “Bunny Fufu” Kurylo is bound to defect next.

Kill Screen Issue 9 kicks off our all-new relaunch. Games are exploding into all sorts of weird new experiences and we’re on the ground to let you know what’s what. From deeply reported features on Lily Zone and the creators of Kentucky Route Zero to gorgeous original photography and illustrations, Issue 9 is a vibrant, accessible vision of videogame culture that we can’t wait for you to read.